Female Masculinity by Judith ‘Jack’ Halberstam

Female Masculinity

Judith ‘Jack’ Halberstam

Masculinity without men. InFemale MasculinityJudith Halberstam takes aim at the protected status of male masculinity and shows that female masculinity has offered a distinct alternative to it for well over two hundred years. Providing the first full-length study on this subject, Halberstam catalogs the diversity of gender expressions among masculine women from nineteenth-century pre-lesbian practices to contemporary drag king performances. Through detailed textual readings as well as empirical research, Halberstam uncovers a hidden history of female masculinities while arguing for a more nuanced understanding of gender categories that would incorporate rather than pathologize them. She rereads Anne Listerrs’s diaries and Radclyffe Hallrs’sThe Well of Lonelinessas foundational assertions of female masculine identity. She considers the enigma of the stone butch and the politics surrounding butch/femme roles within lesbian communities. She also explores issues of transsexuality among ‘transgender dykes’-lesbians who pass as men-and female-to-male transsexuals who may find the label of ‘lesbian’ a temporary refuge. Halberstam also tackles such topics as women and boxing, butches in Hollywood and independent cinema, and the phenomenon of male impersonators. Female Masculinitysignals a new understanding of masculine behaviors and identities, and a new direction in interdisciplinary queer scholarship. Illustrated with nearly forty photographs, including portraits, film stills, and drag king performance shots, this book provides an extensive record of the wide range of female masculinities. And as Halberstam clearly demonstrates, female masculinity is not some bad imitation of virility, but a lively and dramatic staging of hybrid and minority genders.

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Details

ISBN 9780822322436
Genre Sexuality; LGBT Studies/Social Sciences
Copyright Date 1998
Publication Date Dec-98
Publisher Duke University Press
Format Trade Paperback
No. of Pages 352
Notes Lambda Literary Award Finalist
Language English
Rating Good
Paper Type Electronic Format Available
Subject Gender identity; Lesbians; Lesbians/ Identity; Sex role
BookID 3882

Author: LFWBooks